Almost one year ago Victor Gilinsky
and Roger J. Mattson penned the stunning article “Revisiting the NUMEC Affair” in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists.
It describes how in the 1960s Israeli agents and their U.S. collaborators
stole highly enriched uranium from the Pennsylvania NUMEC plant for
Israel’s first atomic weapons.

The two former Nuclear Regulatory Commission
officials’ exposé reveals how 337 kilograms of material, enough for several
weapons, made their way into Israel’s Dimona nuclear weapons facility
likely packed in the same sealed containers as lawful radioactive agricultural
and scientific equipment shipments. It cites a secret CIA diversion
briefing held at the NRC, credible official audits of materials lost
to processing waste and absorption versus diversion, accounts of CIA
recovery in Israel of HEU traces matching the Portsmouth signature of
NUMEC’s government-supplied uranium, and the plant owner’s deep and
ongoing ties to Israeli intelligence case officers and suspicious activities.

Inadvertently, these expert nuclear
diversion researchers make a very strong case against releasing Jonathan
J. Pollard, currently sentenced to life in prison for spying for Israel.
In 1986 espionage investigators discovered and alerted the press that Pollard’s handler, Rafael Eitan, shared
the same birth date as a supposed “chemist, Ministry of Defense,
Israel” who visited NUMEC on Sept. 10, 1968, as part of a “four-
man team.” But it is now clear that the entirety of
the Israeli spy network of agents and operations has not yet been fully
revealed.

Gilinsky and Mattson charge that NUMEC
gravely misled the Atomic Energy Agency when it applied for permission
to host Avraham Bendor (listed as a visitor from the Department of Electronics,
Israel), Avraham Hermoni (scientific counselor, Israeli embassy, Washington),
and Ephraim Biegun (Department of Electronics, Israel). NUMEC
claimed they were all scientific experts visiting Zalman Shapiro to
discuss “thermo electric devices.” But citing an FBI file released
under the Freedom of Information Act [.pdf], Gilinsky and Mattson prove not only that NUMEC lied to the AEC,
but that Israel’s clandestine espionage network, in which Pollard was
only a small cog, was much larger than previously known.

According to the two experts, Israel desperately wanted HEU from the
U.S. for bomb-making in the late 1960s, since scientists could not be
sure that their plutonium-based complex would work as designed, and HEU
could be used as a driver fuel at Dimona. This is why Israel sent over
its top spies to pick up American taxpayer-funded HEU from Shapiro, a
devout Israel supporter and president of a local Zionist Organization
of America chapter.

Shapiro, investigated for years as
a national security risk, was meeting with Israel’s top covert operatives,
none of whom had any expertise in “thermo electric devices.” Ephraim Biegun
was head of the Israeli technical department of its Secret Services
between 1960 to 1970. Avraham Hermoni was technical director of
Israel’s nuclear bomb project at RAFAEL and had a role in the highly
decentralized Dimona project. Bendor was a long-time Shin Bet operative and
Eitan’s “right-hand man” on overseas operations. A 2001
Energy Department audit found that NUMEC’s losses were highest between
1966 and 1968, and only returned to industry standards after Shapiro
left NUMEC when Babcock and Wilcox Company bought the plant in 1971.

This latest revelation of the identities
and motives of Israel’s clandestine network in the U.S. has been all but
drowned out by growing calls for Pollard’s release. As might
be expected, the Zionist
Organization of America
has intensified its calls for Pollard’s release. Former Vice President Dan Quayle is the latest voice in the growing choir of
U.S. and Israeli politicians demanding Obama release the convicted Israeli
spy. In a Jan. 31 letter, Quayle argued that “a life sentence
for the crime committed is very extreme.” He joins former
Secretary of State George Schultz and former Attorney General Michael
Mukasey, along with 38 members of Congress who have formally called for
Pollard’s release

Pollard filed his own request for clemency
with the U.S. pardon attorney on Oct. 15, 2010. On Jan. 3
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu became the first Israeli prime minister
to publicly call for Pollard’s release after September negotiations
for an illegal settlement freeze in exchange for additional U.S. arms
and aid collapsed. Though billed as a measure to “soften
Israeli opposition to peace concessions with the Palestinians,”
it is curious that American proponents of clemency demand nothing useful
from Israel in exchange for Pollard.

Given the latest revelations, this
negotiating stance is clearly unacceptable.

Although Israel promised cooperation
in the aftermath of Pollard’s treason, it
stonewalled U.S. investigators
sent to Israel and never returned the stolen classified U.S. documents.
Contrary to Quayle and Mukasey’s statements, this rendered a full U.S.
damage assessment of documents sent to the Soviet Union impossible,
particularly during the tail end of the Cold War when it mattered most.
“MEGA,” an Israeli mole(s) suspected of helping handler Rafael
Eitan task Pollard with specific file number requests, was never unmasked,
and despite newly released FBI files, Israel’s espionage wing responsible
for obtaining klystrons, krytons, and other nuclear technologies in
addition to raw materials from the U.S. was also never fully revealed
in time to thwart
its many procurement activities
with U.S. collaborators.

Petitioners such as Lawrence Korb,
a former U.S. assistant secretary of defense, claim that former Secretary
of Defense Casper Weinberger’s classified briefing to Judge
Aubry Robinson exaggerated
the harm done to U.S. national security and led to an unduly harsh sentence.
But it is much more likely that Pollard’s own clumsy attempts to avoid
accountability sealed his fate. In court Pollard solicited classified
documents in an attempt to prove that “it was the established policy
of the Department of Justice not to prosecute U.S. citizens for espionage
activities on behalf of Israel.” Pollard’s public relations campaign,
which violated agreements with the court, included interviews with former
AIPAC newsletter editor Wolf
Blitzer in which Pollard
compared himself to an Israeli pilot shot down behind enemy lines.
None of this performance garnered sympathy from Judge Robinson. But
the belief that crimes for Israel should never be punished in the U.S.
continues unabated.

But if President Obama releases Pollard,
it should be preceded by the belated return of the massive trove of
classified documents he stole for Israel as well as all purloined nuclear
materials and technologies. Americans also need more information
about Bendor, Hermoni, and Biegun’s operations targeting the U.S.
If they weren’t really the scientists they claimed to be, then what
were they up to all the years they traveled unfettered throughout
the U.S.? Who beyond Shapiro helped them? Under the ardent
din of Pollard supporters, stakeholders are only beginning to receive
credible damage assessments about the overarching Israeli espionage
network, making his release for nothing seem altogether premature.

Still that last unanswered question, at least in my view- isn't rescuing Pollard all about making America safe for future spies? Pollard as he sits is a serious liability to any recruiting drive Israel might do. On the other hand, once released, he would immediately represent proof of Israeli power over the US, and the fact that, as Bibi has argued, Israel doesn't forget its friends. It's friends just don't happen to include the country that pays all its military bills and makes its continued existence possible- instead, its friends seem to largely consist of traitors against that country.

Future recruits would be hugely easier to acquire if they knew that no power could detain them, if they're on Israel's side. If even an exhibit like Pollard could be sprung, what would any future traitor have to fear?

It is amazing that just two weeks ago the biggest problem facing Israel was how big of a party to give for the return of the israel hero j. Pollard. The prime minister apparently devoted his entire time to getting the hero J. Pollard freed. Now the entire world has imploded on Israel with the disgusting lack of honest effort to find peace in the middle east. What few people understnad about J. Pollard is he sold the secrets to Israel because he could not make the deal with china. He apparently was working with the chinese at some level because he and his wife were on the way to the chinese embassy to avoid being arrested. He was too late and he and his wife never made it to the chinese embassy with a brief case full of documents he intended to barter for his freedom. The Israel hero spy apparently was just an ordinary prostitute but that does not slow the leaders of Israel in giving praise. The leaders of Israel knew they can out shout anyone who points out J. Pollard was a disgusting traitor and not really doing it for anything other than the money.
One other fact to remember is Pollard agreed to stay in jail for life if the USA did not go after the Israel employee who provided the money to J. Pollard. The disgusting individual that J. Pollard was married to was part of that agreement. Would it not be justice to get the wife and the israeli employee and put them in jail for their disgusting criminal conduct.
Pollard should have been hung for what he did.
I am sure Israel actually now wish that he was so this would go away. Israel is getting too much press about how it really is not what they like us to believe.

What is an objective estimate of the damage done by Pollard's espionage activities? How would this compare to the damage done by Robert Hanssen, a FBI agent/Soviet spy who is now serving a life sentence in a "supermax" facility (ie. 23 hour/day solitary confinement)? Why don't we hear a chorus of politicians calling for Hanssen's release?

Obviously. But I would like an honest appraisal from an unbiased source. I am not in favor of Pollard receiving an unjust, overly harsh sentence, but I would like to see how his crimes are less severe than Hanssen's.

"But I would like an honest appraisal from an unbiased source. I am not in favor of Pollard receiving an unjust, overly harsh sentence, but I would like to see how his crimes are less severe than Hanssen's. "

In 1953 the Rosenbergs were fried for their alleged revelation of atomic secrets to the USSR. Alleged because the extent of these revelations was never publicized nor did it occur at a level that could have significantly altered or accelerated the Soviet A-Bomb. That it could have materially helped at all a perceived enemy to develop a threat of devastation of the USA was sufficient to lead to their executions.
Today it turns out that Israel is targeting the USA, along with the rest of the world, not just its "perceived" enemies, with its stolen nuclear arsenal as part of its "Samson Option", the plan to devastate the entire planet in the eventuality of its defeat, an outcome pre-ordained by incessant Israeli aggression and expansionism. Stolen technology since unlike the USSR, Israel never had the resources nor the brains to come with a bomb on its own but had to resort to corruption, bribery and outright theft as in the case of Pollard to cobble together their arsenal, which they hope to now use to intimidate all of humanity in a colossal "protection" racket from the pages of the history of the Mafia now expanded to include the whole world. Read Seymour Hersh's "The Samson Option: Israel's Nuclear Arsenal and American Foreign Policy" (1991) for more on this.
By the precedents set by the Rosenbergs' judgment shouldn't Pollard get the needle, too, much less be freed ?

Until 1998 Israel publicly denied that Pollard was an Israeli spy, although it granted him citizenship in 1995. In Nov. 2010, the relentless campaign to release Pollard was reignited with a letter circulated by Rep. Barney Frank and signed by more than 30 Democratic members of the U.S House of Representatives calling on President Barack Obama to grant clemency to the confessed spy. This was topped off by Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu also requesting Obama release Pollard, who was arrested a quarter century ago on the steps of an Israeli embassy while spying for Israel.

The letter from congress was written in coordination with the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, National Council of Young Israel, B'nai B'rith International, the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, the Zionist Organization of America, Agudath Israel, and former presidential candidate Gary Bauer, who is a fundamentalist Christian Zionist.
See full text and signatures here: http://www.jonathanpollard.org/2010/111810a.htm

According to Ian Williams' article in the July/Aug. 1993 Washington Report, “although Pollard insists he was motivated by concern for Israeli security, he was paid (and is still being paid) a handsome salary by the Israeli government. His Israeli handlers also provided gifts and trips to Europe for Pollard and his wife, Anne. The severity of Pollard's sentence was based on secret testimony by [then-Defense Secretary] Caspar Weinberger, who is on record as saying that Pollard was lucky–he should have received three life sentences. Pollard provided Israeli intelligence with more than 1,000 classified U.S. documents, some consisting of hundreds of pages, comprising overall some 360 cubic feet of paper.

"According to American investigative reporter Seymour Hersh, Pollard sold information on nuclear targets in the Soviet Union to Israel. U.S. defense sources suggest that what caused the most bitter anger against Pollard in the Pentagon and throughout the American intelligence community was the fact that the information compromised human agents in the Soviet Union and elsewhere. U.S. intelligence sources have concluded that the Israeli government bartered this information to the Soviet Union.”

What ever information Pollard sold a quarter of a century ago is old news now, as is everything Vanunu knew about Israel’s Dimona plant where he worked the night shift as a lowly technician twenty-five years ago.

In April 1999, thirty-six members of the House of Representatives signed a letter calling for Vanunu's release from prison because they believed "we have a duty to stand up for men and women like Mordechai Vanunu who dare to articulate a brighter vision for humanity."

President Clinton responded with a public statement expressing concern for Vanunu and the need for Israel and other non-parties to the Non-Proliferation Treaty to adhere to it and accept IAEA safeguards.

But ever since the silence from the US Government has been deafening!

Vanunu told me, “Did you know that President Kennedy tried to stop Israel from building atomic weapons? In 1963, he forced Prime Minister Ben Guirion to admit the Dimona was not a textile plant, as the sign outside proclaimed, but a nuclear plant. The Prime Minister said, ‘The nuclear reactor is only for peace.’

"Everything inside was written in French, when I was there, almost twenty years ago. Back then, the Dimona descended seven floors underground. In 1955, Perez and Guirion met with the French to agree they would get a nuclear reactor if they fought against Egypt to control the Sinai and Suez Canal. That was the war of 1956. Eisenhower demanded that Israel leave the Sinai, but the reactor plant deal continued on.

"Kennedy demanded inspections. When Johnson became president, he made an agreement with Israel that two senators would come every year to inspect. Before the senators would visit, the Israelis would build a wall to block the underground elevators and stairways. From 1963 to ’69, the senators came, but they never knew about the wall that hid the rest of the Dimona from them.

"Nixon stopped the inspections and agreed to ignore the situation. As a result, Israel increased production. In 1986, there were over two hundred bombs. Today, they may have enough plutonium for ten bombs a year."

It would be surprising to see similar sentences for these types of spy case.
Too many factors come into play and therefore, very different sentence can result.
The problem is that US govt is not independent on matters involving Israel and for that
there is an ongoing increasing cost on US taxpayers/interests. Unfortunate for Mr Hanssen, there is no organized powerful Lobby demanding his release.

It is amazing how Israel is pushing for the release of the traitor Pollard. It was an employee of the Israel government that was bag man for the dirty deed. Why would the otherwise smart people of Israel not tell the fools let Pollard rot which he deserves or the USA public might realize pollard was just a lackey of the Israel war machine aka Israel government.
It is interest to listen to pollard wife cry for justice after she cry during his trial that it was ok to be doing theses things because he is jewish and his loyalty was to Israel and not the country he had taken an oath to defend and protect. Pollard wife was part of the action and was arrested with the husband on the way to the chinese embassy with military secrets that they hope would get them a trip out side of the USA. So much for it was not about money but loyalty to Israel. Of course the chinese embassy might be a front for Israel but most likely it just shows the wife and husband did it for the money.

[…] for Benjamin Blumberg (head of LAKAM) and Rafi Eitan (who ran Jonathan Pollard and infiltrated NUMEC). Milchan is also the close confidant of Shimon Peres and Benjamin Netanyahu. According to the […]

[…] for Benjamin Blumberg (head of LAKAM) and Rafi Eitan (who ran Jonathan Pollard and infiltrated NUMEC). Milchan is also the close confidant of Shimon Peres and Benjamin Netanyahu. According to the […]

[…] for Benjamin Blumberg (head of LAKAM) and Rafi Eitan (who ran Jonathan Pollard and infiltrated NUMEC). Milchan is also the close confidant of Shimon Peres and Benjamin Netanyahu. According to the […]

[…] and other assistance in the early 1970s. Eitan’s involvement in obtaining source code of the PROMIS intelligence case management program, a system compromised with secret back doors that was to be installed at the Justice Department and […]

[…] 2013. Although Pollard himself was only a small cog in the Israeli espionage network, Smith points out that none of the files handed over by Pollard to his handler, Rafael Eitan, part of the Israeli […]

[…] 2013. Although Pollard himself was only a small cog in the Israeli espionage network, Smith points out that none of the files handed over by Pollard to his handler, Rafael Eitan, part of the Israeli […]

[…] 2013. Although Pollard himself was only a small cog in the Israeli espionage network, Smith points out that none of the files handed over by Pollard to his handler, Rafael Eitan, part of the Israeli […]

[…] 2013. Although Pollard himself was only a small cog in the Israeli espionage network, Smith points out that none of the files handed over by Pollard to his handler, Rafael Eitan, part of the Israeli […]